The DFDR and CVR were retrieved from the sea bed and read, as per the Lebanese Government decision, at the BEA facility at Le Bourget, France. The recorders data revealed that ET 409 encountered two stick shakers respectively at time 00:40:01 for a period of 29 seconds and at 00:40:56 for a period of 26 seconds. 10 "Bank Angle" warnings were registered between 00:38:41 and 00:40:54; an over-speed clacker was also registered from time 00:41:25 till the end. The maximum registered AOA was 32 degrees at 00:40:14, maximum registered bank angle was 118 degrees Left at 00:41:14, the maximum registered speed was 407.5 knots at 00:41:28, the maximum registered G load was 4.412 at 00:41:28 and the maximum registered nose down pitch value was 63.1 degrees at 00:41:16.
This lot certainly qualifies for an unusual attitude and makes you wonder exactly what sort of unusual attitude training the pilots received. Was it benign unusual attitudes? In other words within the range stated in the Boeing 737 FCTM as pitch attitude greater than 25 degrees nose up, or greater than 10 degrees nose down or bank angle greater than 45 degrees or within the above parameters but flying at airspeeds inappropriate for the conditions.
While unusual attitude G forces cannot be accurately replicated in 737 simulators, the flight instruments are capable of showing extreme attitudes. From reading accident reports involving unusual attitudes the majority were in IMC or dark night suggesting that pilot interpretation of the flight instrument readings were faulty. This is nothing more than a matter of regular simulator practice - not just once every cyclic three years.
One technique often used during practice unusual attitude training in the simulator is to direct the pilot to look down and close his eyes until the instructor says 'Handing over control." This is an ancient throw back to private pilot teaching under the hood to prevent the pilot glancing outside to see which way is up.
In real life, there is no way both pilots in a 737 would have their eyes closed and head down if an unusual attitude occurs. They would be fully aware of what is happening on the instruments as it all happened. But how to recover from that situation is another story altogether.
This is where unusual attitude training in the simulator must involve extreme attitudes not just a pussy cat approach. Note the extreme attitudes reached in the Beirut Ethiopean Airways situation. Obviously a competent pilot would have made the appropriate recovery control movements well before the aircraft reached an unrecoverable attitude and altitude. All the more reason for the investigation to look closely at how unusual attitudes are taught in the simulator and the qualification standard of the instructor to teach these manoeuvres. . Ticking the boxes means nothing. For example,
50 degrees angle of bank and 25 degrees nose up is defined as an unusual attitude. That may satisfy the check pilot as sufficient to tick the box and allow him to get back to more important things like the automatics
But in doing so, he may have sold the crew short. And one night, a Beirut style disaster happens.
During the manouvering of the Ethiopean 737 there were two bouts of stick shakers and ten bank angle announcements. Seems that stalls were imminent at least and whatever recovery action taken (if any) was wrong or ineffective or both.
It was timely therefore to read the following letter to the editor of Aviation Week & Space Technology published 21 March 2011 and titled "
Stymied by Stalls
"I am a retired U.S. Air Force pilot and a NASA astronaut with about 5000 hours in jet fighters and trainers, and I was a jet instructor pilot for more than three years.
With all this background, I never knew anyone who lost control of an aircraft and flew into the ground due to a stall. For one thing, stall recovery and unusual attitude recovery were essential parts of pilot training.
Even more important to ask what the pilot was doing while the aircraft got into a stall. Stalls occur when the angle of attack exceeds the critical value, and that normally occurs when the airspeed becomes too low or vertical acceleration (G-load) too high. These conditions do not occur instantaneously, and there is almost sufficient time for an alert pilot to recover with little loss of altitude.
Have we become so frugal with training time that we no longer teach pilots stall and unusual attitude recovery? Or have pilots become so complacent that they allow the automatic pilot to fly the aircraft without human monitoring?
For too long, unusual attitude training in the simulator has been tacked on as an afterthought towards the end of a session and not addressed seriously. Unusual attitude recovery from serious attitudes - not pussy cat ones - require good manipulative handling skills. It is a fact that automation has degraded these very skills needed for survival on a dark and stormy night. Throw in the propensity to have low hour recently graduated cadet pilots in the second in command seat and you have a recipe for potential disaster.